Cyclone’s huge floods leave hundreds dead

CHIMANIMANI, Zimbabwe — Aid workers rushed to rescue victims clinging to trees and crammed on rooftops Tuesday after a cyclone unleashed devastating floods in Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi. More than 350 people were confirmed dead, hundreds were missing and thousands more were at risk.

In Mozambique, the rapidly rising floodwaters created “an inland ocean,” endangering tens of thousands of families, aid workers said as they scrambled to rescue survivors and airdrop, food, water and blankets to survivors of Cyclone Idai.

“This is the worst humanitarian crisis in Mozambique’s recent history,” said Jamie LeSueur, head of response efforts for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

Mozambique’s President Filipe Nyusi said late Tuesday more than 200 people had been confirmed dead in his country. Earlier he said the death toll could reach 1,000.

At least 400,000 people were left homeless.

The cyclone created southern Africa’s most destructive flooding in 20 years, said emergency workers. Heavy rains were expected to continue through Thursday.

Mozambique’s Pungue and Buzi rivers overflowed, creating “inland oceans extending for miles and miles in all directions,” said Herve Verhoosel of the World Food Program.

“This is a major humanitarian emergency that is getting bigger by the hour,” Verhoosel said.

He said people were “crammed on rooftops and elevated patches of land.”

“People visible from the air may be the lucky ones and the top priority now is to rescue as many as possible,” he said.

Many areas remained impassible. With key roads washed away, aid groups were trying to get badly needed food, medicine and fuel into the hard-hit city of Beira, on Mozambique’s coast, by air and by sea.

Satellite images were helping the rescue teams target the most critical areas, Haga said. Rescue operations were based at Beira airport, one of the few places in the city with working communications.

The waters flooded a swath of land more than 150 square miles in central Mozambique, according to the European Union’s global observation program, which was mapping the crisis, putting more than 100,000 people at risk.

Zinyange Auntony / AFP/Getty Images Women dry clothes recovered from rubble on Tuesday in the Ngangu township of Chimanimani, after the area was hit by the Cyclone Idai. More than a thousand people are feared to have died in Mozambique alone while scores have been killed and more than 200 are missing in neighbouring Zimbabwe following the deadliest cyclone to hit southern Africa.